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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/26652730">just us</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/V_fics/pseuds/V_fics'>V_fics</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>V's ML fics [17]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Miraculous Ladybug</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Aeon | Uncanny Valley is a Cyborg, Backstory, Gen, Human Experimentation, Special: Miraculous World: New York – United HeroeZ</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-09-26</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-09-26</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-06 10:21:29</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>1,843</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/26652730</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/V_fics/pseuds/V_fics</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>It wasn’t planned to be “Jess and Aeon”, but it happens anyway.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Aeon | Uncanny Valley &amp; Jess | Sparrow, Olympia Hill | Majestia/Barbara Keyes | Knightowl</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>V's ML fics [17]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/series/1998523</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>5</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>63</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>just us</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>The concept of Knightowls adopting Sparrows was azarathianscribbles on tumblr's idea &lt;3</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Majestia hates it when kids get involved.</p><p>The appearance of superheroes grew with the advancement of technology, as more of the world they inhabited was understood, the further humanity’s reach went. Few disclosed the origins of their natures, but some have it revealed by outside forces, and others have always been within the spotlight.</p><p>She’s seen many child heroes. Some were accidental, a sheer coincidence of chemicals and reactions. Some were born with powers, and developed them as they grew, mysteries to be solved.</p><p>And some are unfortunate enough to be engineered.</p><p>Most of them end up dying, their body compositions volatile and in pain, precise calculations distilled down into luck and guesswork, because no one <em>really</em> knows how their powers manifest. Experimental heroes are dangerous and fragile, and children ever moreso.</p><p>Superpowers are not a fixed science, no matter what people think.</p><p>The hardest part of being a hero is not the lives you fail to save, but the lives you must let go.</p><p>So, when a rogue laboratory gets blown up the second they step inside, Majestia expects any test subjects to die long before they can move the rubble. Even those encoded with healing factors can find themselves dying, as their bodies regenerate around shrapnel. There’s a reason why heroes only make up a fraction of the population. Even those who come by their gifts through freak accidents can find themselves in an early grave.</p><p>And yet, once they’ve sifted through all the broken foundations and collapsed roofs, there is one survivor. Majestia carries out a young girl, not even five years old, her deep dark skin dusted with debris. She does not cough or cry in the wreckage, she does not even bleed, yet her body is warm beneath the whirring prosthetics and the rhythmic beating of her mechanical heart.</p><p>The hospitals are ill-equipped to deal with her. Her limbs are advanced technology, and many of her organs are engineered equivalents. Her eyes have been enhanced with some sort of scanner embedded into her retinas. The doctors and scientists say that they’ve never seen anything like her.</p><p>She realises, if she lets the girl stay, she will never come out from under the spotlight of curiosity.</p><p>She pulls strings and wires to get “Ayon Milliard” adopted by Olympia Hill. She rationalises it as working for the greater good. Discovery will always advance forwards, with or without delays. A child’s life can improve the future in ways that technology never will.</p><p>After all, <em>she</em> turned out fine.</p><p> </p><p>The Knightowl and the Sparrow are a partnership borne of kindness and generosity, founded in the willingness to teach others and to love them in turn. Sometimes, things don’t work out that way, but other times, they do.</p><p>Jessica is eight years old when Barbara first meets her, a jaded little girl bouncing around in the foster care system, a stream of red tape trailing into the unknown. She’s all too aware that she is unwanted, undesired, unneeded. She’s quick on her feet and even quicker off the ground. When Barbara asks who taught her to fly, she rolls her eyes and snaps back that her name is <em>Jess</em>, not Jessica.</p><p>It’s a terrible idea, but Barbara Keyes has been there herself.</p><p>Jess’ troubles come out in slow, cold bursts. She’s ultimately incredibly quiet, her brash devil-may-care attitude hiding a sensitive soul. She flinches at loud noises, tucks herself into empty cabinets when startled, and pushes people away before they can get too close. Barbara’s seen it all before. Jess tests her, pushes her buttons and stomps on boundaries, just to see if Barbara will give up on her just like everyone else.</p><p>But Barbara’s faced down more stubborn adversaries than a traumatised child.</p><p>And it certainly helps that Jess and Aeon get along like a house on fire.</p><p> </p><p>Olympia wasn’t sure how it’d all turn out. Dating another superhero was equivalent to dating a co-worker. There were pros and cons, and with regards to their duty towards the better good, superhero dating was strictly forbidden. All superheroes were to hold an equal respect and priority to each other, and there was no use letting emotions compromise you.</p><p>Or so everyone <em>said</em>. So long as they weren’t nepotic, the Union did not care what they got up to in their personal lives.</p><p>And in Olympia’s defence, she didn’t <em>know</em> Barbara was Knightowl. All she saw was a haughty socialite-looking woman in a fur coat who shoved her to the ground when an anvil crashed through the window of a coffee shop. The coat was completely ruined, but the lady pulled herself to her impossibly thin heels and evacuated everyone to safety. And for a split second, Olympia understood why the people she rescued believed they were in love with her.</p><p>However, she was looking respectfully, and so as much as those sharp brown eyes held her gaze, she was not going to pursue a date solely because of an adrenaline induced rescue.</p><p>And then they kept bumping into each other. Over, and over, and on the third unexpected rendezvous Olympia finally asked for her number, because everything about Barbara <em>screamed</em> “high femme”, and somehow, someway, everything between them fell right into place.</p><p>Including their children.</p><p> </p><p>Barbara wasn’t sure what to make of Aeon at first. She seemed perfectly ordinary, if a little literal-minded and overly analytical. She tended to start sentences with “Statistically speaking,” and had an encyclopaedic memory of facts. It wasn’t <em>odd</em>, not to her, there were many superheroes who bolstered their power sets by being prodigies in some field, and many others who were pioneering new technological advancements.</p><p>She just wasn’t sure if Jess would see her the same way. The girl never made lasting friends at school, being so unwilling to trust strangers, and even more unwilling to so openly depend on them for such things as friendship. She wasn’t a ticking time bomb waiting to explode, more like an ice cube you had to keep cool lest it melt through your fingers.</p><p>And it turns out Aeon Hill was walk-in freezer levels of chill.</p><p> </p><p>Jessica Keyes is ten years, one-hundred-sixty-seven days, twenty hours, fourteen minutes and thirty-eight seconds old when Aeon first meets her, give or take a few seconds. Mother says she isn’t supposed tell people that, so Aeon does the calculations and keeps it in her memory. Jess is fourteen centimetres taller than her, and her hair is tied in a fashion known as a ponytail. Mother’s hair isn’t long enough to do that, and Aeon’s hair isn’t of the same texture as to accomplish the same effect.</p><p>Jessica Keyes blood pressure rises by ten millimeters of mercury when she meets Aeon, and her calculations deduce that she is nervous around the presence of an unknown individual. So, Aeon holds out her hand, gives a practiced smile, and introduces herself.</p><p>“Hello, my name is Aeon. It’s very nice to meet you.”</p><p>Jessica Keyes stares at her with an expression Aeon recognises to be confusion, but she cautiously takes the proffered hand and shakes it.</p><p>“Call me Jess,” Jess says, her aural tone registering as cautious. “How do you spell ‘Aeon’?”</p><p>“A-Y-O-N,” Aeon says matter-of-factly. “But I prefer to spell it ‘A-E-O-N’, due to the denoted definition of that word referring to various synonyms for ‘life’, ‘eternity’, and uncountable periods of time.”</p><p>“Isn’t it pronounced ‘e-on’?” Jess’ head tilts, not in judgement but in curiosity.</p><p>“It is,” Aeon replies with a smile and a hop in her heels, the balls of her feet remaining on the floor. “But I believe that language should be prescriptivist and adhere to what people wish to make of it, rather than firmly to descriptive rules.”</p><p>Jess stares at her for a moment, presses her lips together, and then says, slowly:</p><p>“I understand all of those words separately.”</p><p>Aeon’s heart rate rises. She is feeling excited, but Mother has told her not to explain things unless people ask for an explanation. Most humans don’t like being informed by a child, which Aeon is. Even if they are another child.</p><p>Jess’ brows furrow at her. She is now judging Aeon’s features. Her lips press together again, a picture of confusion, and then she asks, “Can you tell me what you’re saying?”</p><p>Jess is exactly ten years, one-hundred-sixty-seven days, twenty hours, seventeen minutes, and two seconds old when Aeon decides she likes her.</p><p> </p><p>Jess likes Aeon because she doesn’t fit in either. She catches the looks people give the other girl, ones that Aeon doesn’t openly acknowledge. The girl isn’t <em>oblivious</em>, Jess can tell by the flicker of her eyes, but she has the unerring ability to disregard any criticism, subtle or otherwise.</p><p>They’re complete opposites, really. Jess doesn’t like to talk to other people, but Aeon talks a lot. Jess prefers the unquantifiable, and Aeon knows everything about anything that’s remotely countable. Jess likes to eat, Aeon forgets to. Jess is terrified by horror films, and Aeon is far too composed.</p><p>Their parents have been dating for two years when Jess finds out Aeon’s secret. When she’s dropped off to hang out (because she’s twelve years old, and twelve year olds do not have <em>playdates</em>), she finds Aeon curled up in a ball, tucked down into the corner of her bedroom between a clothes drawer and her bed.</p><p>The kids at school had called her a robot, cold, heartless, inhuman. But Jess knows otherwise.</p><p>Because Aeon’s hugs feel like holding a fresh piece of toast, and Aeon might not be afraid of horror movies but she keeps the lights on just like Jess does and doesn’t like being hugged but is always willing to give one to Jess if she asks and when things are too loud and too bright she lets Jess take her hand and fit herself into a small space while Jess stands guard and when Jess gives up on trying to understand the way Aeon sees the universe Aeon will cross over into her imagination and think of mystical alternate worlds and alien lifeforms and draw out dreams from the pinholes in the sky.</p><p>“Friends,” Jess says, holding Aeon’s heated, shaking hand to her cheek. “We are friends, Aeon. Even if you were a robot, you’d still be my friend, and you would be my best friend.”</p><p>Aeon’s eyes shimmer, and she tugs her hand free.</p><p>“Are you sure?”</p><p>“Statistically speaking, I am one-hundred percent sure.”</p><p>Aeon takes her hand again and stares down at it. Jess looks down too.</p><p>The girl’s hand shimmers, a little like her eyes, and Jess is finds herself holding the hand of a girl welded together with darkness and gold.</p><p>She’s even prettier than the stars.</p><p> </p><p>And so they were, the two of them, Jess and Aeon, Aeon and Jess. So long as they had each other, they could withstand anything.</p><p>“Metaphorically speaking,” Aeon interrupts, not because Jess doesn't know, but because she's teasing her. "Our emotional connection would give us no advantage to a physical force—"</p><p>Jess throws a pillow at her.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>I promise Aeon's narration and speech will get less formal/robotic once when time skip to the NY special! i love me some character development through words.</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
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